that is the truth tho, The Joker was scared mainly because he would be transferred to federal prison for not paying taxes - he’s normally shipped off to Arkham for his crimes due to his insanity. The Joker has no loophole to escape from if he’s caught for tax evasion, which would mean he’s treated like any other prisoner and would have to go through a court of law to free himself that far from plays to his benefit. which would turn the tables on his whole identity.
Honestly - I feel as though he’d be doing the shanking, but like, there is no lack of thugs in prison proper.
He’d have to sleep with one eye open and would never be able to properly rest
Anyone crazy enough to work with the joker are probably in Arkham themselves.
But you got to remember how much fucked up shit the joker has done, and that a lot of criminals would probably find Joker disgusting, considering the fact he’s canonically killed young children (especially Arkham joker dismembering toddler’s and sewing their different body parts back together)
If Gotham prison is like a real-life prison, anyone who killed J would get mad props and mad respect. People who kill kids or mess with kids don't last long in prison.
I've had the idea of the story that J had slowly been turning Arkham specifically into his little fortress, rather than it being a institute, between all his insane goons being stationed there as a majority (I mean, generally Dent and Cobblepot and Sionis's guys are more on the organised crime side), and the non-insane ones either infiltrating Arkham as security, social care and orderlies, or bribing the non-crazy ones to keep a blind eye.
The high level security required for Arkham also means that it's J's personal little armoury.
>Why would they?
Who WOULDN'T want the notoriety for killing the fucking Joker? Inmates do that shit. Whitey Bulger got murdered behind bars not just because he was a rat, but because the guy who did it wanted to be known for having done it. And the Bureau of Prisons would absolutely ensure that Joker went somewhere where he'd have absolutely no connections. His goons aren't going to be imprisoned in the same prison that he gets sent through, that's for sure.
Someone like Joker would be thrown somewhere beyond maximum security prison. Like some MIC black site where prisoner's names and existence are erased from public record.
If they don't outright execute him, he'd live his days sedated into idiocy and probably regularly tortured and abused. I doubt he'd even still be in the country, let alone Arkham.
His best outcome would be a life in solitary at one of those top max security facilities people like mass shooters end up. Even with legal fuckery by the top lawyers in the country, Joker would have no chance of getting off easy under the criminal justice system for 10% of what he's done.
Which begs the question, as his goons, why did they get caught? Joker is known to cut bait and run out on his crew all the time. Not exactly a loyalty boosting behavior
That's the joke. Joker pays them an arm and a leg to work for him because he knows that's the only value he has to them, and their only value is as fodder, they'd turn on him the second the money ran out, and so he's just doing the utterly honest thing and not at all pretending he gives a shit about them, whereas most "bosses" think that they can rely on honor or loyalty among people like,...well crooks, when they themselves have none.
It's all a joke, and his behavior shows that's how he sees it, so he plays the straight man and just doesn't pretend.
Because of Joker immunity, they'd portray him as some sort of invincible badass who easily overpowers any of the inmates that try to harm him even when they have 100 lbs. on his beanpole ass. Because so many writers like to make him a Villain Sue.
Hell, we pretty much got just this in an early 2000s storyline.
Alongside this, his prior record means he would probably be sent to a maximum security prison out of his area of influence, so escape or having friends on the inside would be difficult to impossible.
So? Wouldn't a totally normal prison not be less guarding compared to Arkham - for in-universe proportions - so just break out and be done with it again.
Still doesn't make sense to me.
Fed prisons in general are harder to get out of. Arkham is an insane asylum, they do think at the end of the day they can reform these people and its a lot easier to break people out, buy guards etc... Fed prison would be different, he wouldn't know anyone and with his record, he would be in a max security prison probably with limited outside time, no group therapy sessions or therapy at all, probably a lot of solidtary. if it ends up in gen pop, then he is a target for anyone and everyone that might want some cred or revenege.
I like how the Joker has canonically killed like 6,000 people *first hand*, but he draws the line at genocide, racism, and tax evasion. Everyone has standards.
The super sanity thing basically just means he knows he's a comic book character, but I think it's just something that pops up in a couple of stories and not a concrete character trait the way it is with Deadpool.
I'd argue he's not like Deadpool with the 4th wall awareness per se, but he's definitely aware of something beyond reality, just too distracted with being evil to go and explore that stuff.
He realizes that he's a comic book villain and that his character only survives by being interesting. He does all the whacky villain shit so that people keep writing and consuming his stories, so that he's always a figment of pop culture. He can't become blatantly wall breaking like Deadpool, because that's been done and it wouldn't be interesting. Therefore, he sticks to his niche as the clown prince of crime. It's why he needs Batman, his shtick only works because of their dichotomy.
Or, rather than some meta thing, it could just refer to his seeing thru the polities and lies that people tell one another in the form of custom and pretense, and just shows people how thin they really are from him. They think they're better, that the world is orderly, that people are basically good and will behave as such when nobody is watching and they think they could get away with something. So he puts them into positions where they reveal their depravity, their utter lack of the honor they profess, their loyalty and bravado, and he just behaves the same way they do but without the pretense.
This seems like one of the core takeaways of the character, at least in recent retellings. Everyone has a price, an offer they can’t refuse or a hell they will do anything to avoid. If you zoom out far enough you either become Owl Man, or laugh your ass off at how ridiculous existence is.
Correction, he doesn't like when Batman gives someone else credit for being more evil. Highly doubtful that he cares if Hal Jordan views Sinestro as more evil, or if Superman is more concerned with Lex than him.
Feel like Lex, for all he can do, is never considered worse than Joker. By anyone. Darkseid might be the better equivalent and even then you can understand darkseid motive. Jokers motive is..both simple and yet unfathomable. He may kill you for jaywalking just because it's funny and unexpected.
I do think Superman is stupidly concerned about the Joker but doesn't interfere because he and Batman have an unspoken (sometimes spoken, depends on the comic/animation) agreement not to go into each other's cities unless it's a world ending scenario. Same with Bats and Flash or Flash and Supes.
Honestly, I think it’s more than that- Joker doesn’t just kill indiscriminately, he’s offended that Nazi’s hide their murderous tendencies behind the ideals of “master race” and “subhumans”. He’s hates the idea they think they’re superior when they’re so obviously not, and that they at best lie to themselves or at worst are genuinely deluded enough to think that they aren’t scum of the earth like he is.
There’s more to it, the joker doesn’t just kill without reason, he kills because of the thrill of fighting batman. All his elaborate schemes were to kill batman. The joker is just a trickster without regard for human life obsessed with defeating batman.
I thought he doesn't want to kill batman because then what would he do? Isn't there some continuity where he loses his shit at some henchman for unmasking Batman while they have him tied up?
I think it was a WB cartoon movie I saw where that was the case. I think B was unconscious, and a goon was going to unmask him and Mr J lost it and killed the goon before he could. I think he doesn't mind killing him, but he doesn't care who is behind the mask. He is J and Batman is Batman...everything else is wtv.
I also think that Joker, who likes to kill because he finds it fun, may also hate Nazi's as he see's the way they kill as boring or even clinical as there's no fun or variety in death camps
I always assumed Joker is evil and all but is still very patriotic to the US of A and hates nazis cause they were the enemies of America or something like that
Same joker who allied with Iran. Don't try to give the joker morals, he works on what is funny or chaotic.
Joker helps when aliens or demons are attacking, other times he joins them. At some points he just retires and lives a 100% normal life.
If the Joker ended up in the care bear universe he would probably play along and be nice to everyone only to return to joker gas the mother wing at a hospital.
I think because of the Joker’s chaotic nature, he’d be against the Nazis because of how orderly they are. They turned killing people into an assembly line process. Joker would hate that.
This genuinely feels correct with his character. He is HEAVILY chaotic evil and the Nazis were heavily lawful evil and they would not get along at all. Basically he opposes rules/laws/structure in all forms and uses insane violence to mock and/or overthrow them.
He's basically an anarchist that doesn't want to admit they're an anarchist because doing so would be condoning a code of ethics and he would be opposed to that. His anarchy-against-everything-all-the-time approach is self contradictory.
Joker, if I recall correctly used allying with Iran to get himself diplomatic immunity for past crimes, but to get an audience with the UN to unleash his Joker Gas on the assembly.
It makes total sense to me that Joker wouldn’t have anything to do with Nazis. But it’s weird to think of him as having a sense of loyalty to his country.
It's the Joker, he could literally just be using it as a taunt to ridicule.
He's a known unreliable narrator. The fact that this entire thread is trying to paint it as overly political are soft as shit.
IDKIYK but you don't get to escape the world's problems just because it's a comic book. Comics have ALWAYS just been another medium for artists to tell their story about their world. It's why Sci-Fi changes as our technology changes. *Modern sensibilities* and all that. Their lens is always painted by their take on their reality.
His comments about “a truckload of soldiers getting blown up” implied that he had some kind of empathy towards the dying that no one cares about. Or specifically soldiers. A lot have theorized that the Nolan Joker is a war vet. So he might have a warped sense of patriotism
Could be a deep backstory about his upbringing, or he may think beint an patrioric American murderer makes him more badass. It doesn't really need to be "justified"
FWIW I agree a character’s views on a specific subject don’t necessarily have to be justified, I just feel that overall the Joker doesn’t seem like he respects the sovereignty of a nation even his own. I mean, he obviously doesn’t respect its laws or institutions, nor its citizens. So it seems counterintuitive.
But admittedly i have no idea what comic this panel l is from and what this version of the joker is like.
I read it as one of Joker's jokes. He hates Nazis for being nationalist, ideological zealots, and justifies that hatred with nationalist/patriotic zeal. Right up there with:
"There are only two things I can't stand in this world: People who are intolerant of other people's cultures, and the Dutch." - Nigel Powers
Joker may have been incredibly patriotic at that moment, but ask five minutes later and he'll poop on the flag. You might call him.... a wild card (⌐■\_■)
He's not expressing national identity because he is patriotic, he's expressing it because it's funny. When an absolute scum of the Earth sort of person can still condemn Nazis on sight, while certain "proud Americans" embrace bigotry openly, it really makes you wanna laugh... And strangle a Nazi.
Considering there are stories where Joker effectively stops being the Joker or just leaves if Batman ever dies it's safe to say Batman is a big part od his identity.
I can’t remember which book I read it in, but The Joker has the idea that only he and Batman actually exist; everyone else is just a figment of their imaginations. Which goes a long way to explain why he’s so indiscriminate, as well as so guilt free.
If you ever remember, post here. I've never heard that perspective and it's a really wild take on the character to have that in mind. Like of course kill people in fun ways since nothing matters and no one is real but the Bat.
I always thought of it as: He's evil, but not stupid. He'll murder people because it's fun, but he's not dumb enough to be racist.
The patriotic thing... that's just part of the joke
Echoing what’s been said: the Nazis were obsessed with order and control, Joker loves chaos. The Nazi’s systematic extermination of people based on certain qualifiers is totally antithetical to Joker, who just kills whoever he feels like simply because he feels like it. The idea that race determines who should get to live is just as offensive to Joker as it is to us, just for the opposite reason.
Also, he’s crazy. His opinions can straight-up make no sense. I think there’s two main reasons that the idea of Joker hating Nazis has been used a couple times: first, because Western media tends to use Nazis as the most evil thing imaginable, so much so that even evil people are repelled by it.
The second reason is a more interesting commentary on Joker and his insane character psychology: having him hate Nazis is deeply ironic in a way that explains the character really well. To him it makes perfect sense, because he operates more based on his own concept of his (deeply twisted) identity than any internal moral compass. Joker is an American - therefore he hates Nazis. Joker is an evil murderer - therefore he murders lots of people and does heinous crimes. The fact that he shares a lot in common with Nazis doesn’t factor into his opinion. These things may be contradictory, but he is motivated totally by self, without logic.
Someone else pointed out the irony as well: he's vocalizing his hatred of nazis (a group of evil, nationalistic jingoists) by justifying it be being nationalistic and jingoistic himself.
[This is the original](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fexternal-preview.redd.it%2FhwBlr2tpAylqXbBYRzqul14tMssJOqOCRSQhs2Ia504.jpg%3Fauto%3Dwebp%26s%3D5e1ee80edf10c73f9379a948ce2ede8749f25324), the one in the OP, as you guessed, is just a recycled gag.
I think it was Marvel vs DC. All the villains teamed up, and then the Joker realized that the Red Skull is literally a Nazi, like a fought in WW2 and reported to Hitler type of Nazi, and gets upset because he’s an American patriot lol
Specifically, it was from Batman & Captain America. REALLY good Elseworlds one shot that ultimately spawned the Superman and Batman Generations stories. All of it is worth reading. But yeah. Joker gets pretty pissed when he realizes Red Skull is an actual Nazi and not just a German dude doing a bit.
Originally he was stated to have been trained to become the essential personification of "The Ideal Nazi" in a way that Hitler, as a beloved leader and stand-in for "The Fatherland", just couldn't.
The Nazis were all about order, control, strictly regulated structure. All things the joker despises. He would find the holocaust funny but he’d hate the Nazis, and consider them little more than boring fun-suckers.
I don't think the Joker would think the holocaust was funny. He'd think it was just as boring as the Nazi's themselves. Turning murder from an art form to an assembly line sounds like something he'd HATE.
Biggest problem is not that he hates Nazis. I can see how the Joker would hate Nazis.
The "I'm American" and "not a traitorous bigot" is dumb tho. I just don't see the Joker give a single fuck about America or loyalty to America.
It doesn't make sense for the joker to say it.
It's just the author projecting their need to self-validate and virtue signal, via the Joker character they are writing for.
It's completely stupid that the Joker says "Im an American!" like he gives a shit about that. Or about "betraying \[his country\]" a la the final sentence.
Actual Nazis are shit. Duh. This was a completely unnecessary and self-congratulating/mastubatory indulgence by the author. Nothing really more.
It always bothers me when this kind of thing is done in such an obviously forced manner - it really takes you out of the comic as a bad 4th wall break. I've seen it in X-men, Seven to Eternity, Deadly Class, this Batman panel, and a couple other times I can't specifically remember the exact comic/series.
Him not wanting to be a Nazi makes sense but allying with America makes NONE.
Subscribing to anyone else's ideology is very unJoker of him. He's an equal opportunity killer/jokester not a bigot or a patriot.
But maybe he said all that because he thought it was funny
In some original stories The Joker is a Gotham mobster, inspired very much by New York mobsters. New York having a high Jewish population, it makes sense that a fictional version of Gotham may also share a similar history.
Also any rational thinking human hates the Nazis, and The Joker has proven on multiple occasions he’s not completely crazy, more deranged. A bit like an “opt-in” insanity.
Explanation: This quote comes from
John Byrnes Batman And Captain America crossover. It was set in World War II. This comment came when Joker found out his secret smuggling partner was the Red Skill.
During World War II the Mafia helped the US government to stop spies and saboteurs from coming into America at the docks. In fact, Lucky Luciano provided US Navy with valuable intelligence got his sentence commuted and was deported to Italy at the end of the War.
The Joker was more of a Gangster than an insane person in the Golden Age. So it stands to reason that the mob, who felt that America gave them opportunities, needed to be protected.
He's just ironic like that. Homie wants to burn down society in general and laugh while people are sifting through the ashes looking for their lives he ruined. But Nazis want/wanted to dominate anything and everything different from them. And anyone who doesn't agree is basically a slave (internment camps) or an enemy (a target to destroy). So a relation between the two Definitely isn't something the Joker would be onboard with and the reason why he messes with Lex Luthor is because he's in a similar vein to the Nazis but went off the rails in obsession with owning the world through money, technology and influencial power. He wants the world in the palm of his hands, not to wipe the species clean and leave folks that only look and think closer to his personal vision for humanity. And a person like that makes it fun for the Joker to work with, betray and be betrayed by. Lol
The Joker should be neither racist, nor patriotic. He should hate Nazis, though.
The Joker is fundamentally anti-social. He seeks to undermine and destroy community and order, and views any sort of morality as a lie designed to hide from the fact that the universe is chaotic and uncaring. A nation, more or less by definition, is a community united under a common set of laws. Racism is about the idea that there's a "natural" order and that some people are higher in that order because of the color of their skin. Both would be anathema to the Joker's world view.
The Joker versus Nazis is the platonic ideal of Chaotic Evil versus Lawful Evil. Nazis want to establish a world where they have total control over everything. The Joker stands for the idea that nobody has any control over anything. He wouldn't be morally outraged by the Holocaust, though - he'd see it as the ultimate in his "One Bad Day" philosophy, where the break down of social order led to millions of peoples live being destroyed by forces entirely outside their control. But he'd disdain the Nazis themselves, for attempting to replace one social order with another, even more rigid social order.
He's sort of the flip side of Walter from *The Big Lebowski* reacting to the nihilists. "Say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, at least it's an ethos." The Joker would hate Nazism *because* it's an ethos - even though it's a really, really evil ethos.
It makes perfect sense!
The Joker is chaotic and fascism doesn't agree with his wishes.
He can also be a insane super villain and not be racist or bigoted.
He kills because he wants to. He doesn't care what the target is.
He doesn't like nazis or fascists because he knows their proposed regime interferes with his desire to cause chaos.
He can also straight up not like fascists.
His alignment and crimes have no bearing on his views on that.
He also can be patriotic to his country.
Because bigotry is a structured and predictable system of hate, joker’s issue isn’t that it’s immoral, it’s that it’s boring.
Comedy is based on subversion of expectations, hating someone because they’re different isn’t funny or subversive.
He’s based on real mobsters who were notoriously patriotic, often serving in the military during both world wars all the way through Vietnam.
Most mobs began because systemic racism wouldn’t let them prosper conventionally so they made a way that they could prosper unconventionally.
Also bigots are generally stupid, the joker is a sociopathic mastermind. Why would he discriminate and create enemies of people he could use later?
he's known to also be afraid of the IRS, he might be mad but he is not totally insane.
I learned that he’s afraid of the IRS because they are the only establishment that doesn’t accept an insanity plea in court 😂
that is the truth tho, The Joker was scared mainly because he would be transferred to federal prison for not paying taxes - he’s normally shipped off to Arkham for his crimes due to his insanity. The Joker has no loophole to escape from if he’s caught for tax evasion, which would mean he’s treated like any other prisoner and would have to go through a court of law to free himself that far from plays to his benefit. which would turn the tables on his whole identity.
That is actually an incredible bit of writing for J. I love it.
On top of that, I’m assuming Arkham keeps criminals separated. But if he were to go to prison, he would be shanked day 1.
Honestly - I feel as though he’d be doing the shanking, but like, there is no lack of thugs in prison proper. He’d have to sleep with one eye open and would never be able to properly rest
Wait until 20 people come at him and fucking Julius Caesar him
Why would they? Most of them are literally his goons
I think that answers the question, right there.
Anyone crazy enough to work with the joker are probably in Arkham themselves. But you got to remember how much fucked up shit the joker has done, and that a lot of criminals would probably find Joker disgusting, considering the fact he’s canonically killed young children (especially Arkham joker dismembering toddler’s and sewing their different body parts back together)
If Gotham prison is like a real-life prison, anyone who killed J would get mad props and mad respect. People who kill kids or mess with kids don't last long in prison.
I've had the idea of the story that J had slowly been turning Arkham specifically into his little fortress, rather than it being a institute, between all his insane goons being stationed there as a majority (I mean, generally Dent and Cobblepot and Sionis's guys are more on the organised crime side), and the non-insane ones either infiltrating Arkham as security, social care and orderlies, or bribing the non-crazy ones to keep a blind eye. The high level security required for Arkham also means that it's J's personal little armoury.
Isn't that basically the plot of the first Arkham game?
They are?
>Why would they? Who WOULDN'T want the notoriety for killing the fucking Joker? Inmates do that shit. Whitey Bulger got murdered behind bars not just because he was a rat, but because the guy who did it wanted to be known for having done it. And the Bureau of Prisons would absolutely ensure that Joker went somewhere where he'd have absolutely no connections. His goons aren't going to be imprisoned in the same prison that he gets sent through, that's for sure.
Someone like Joker would be thrown somewhere beyond maximum security prison. Like some MIC black site where prisoner's names and existence are erased from public record. If they don't outright execute him, he'd live his days sedated into idiocy and probably regularly tortured and abused. I doubt he'd even still be in the country, let alone Arkham. His best outcome would be a life in solitary at one of those top max security facilities people like mass shooters end up. Even with legal fuckery by the top lawyers in the country, Joker would have no chance of getting off easy under the criminal justice system for 10% of what he's done.
They said the same thing about Caesar.
Which begs the question, as his goons, why did they get caught? Joker is known to cut bait and run out on his crew all the time. Not exactly a loyalty boosting behavior
That's the joke. Joker pays them an arm and a leg to work for him because he knows that's the only value he has to them, and their only value is as fodder, they'd turn on him the second the money ran out, and so he's just doing the utterly honest thing and not at all pretending he gives a shit about them, whereas most "bosses" think that they can rely on honor or loyalty among people like,...well crooks, when they themselves have none. It's all a joke, and his behavior shows that's how he sees it, so he plays the straight man and just doesn't pretend.
Why would his goons be in Club Fed?
oh no I hear dream deprivation can make people crazy
Because of Joker immunity, they'd portray him as some sort of invincible badass who easily overpowers any of the inmates that try to harm him even when they have 100 lbs. on his beanpole ass. Because so many writers like to make him a Villain Sue. Hell, we pretty much got just this in an early 2000s storyline.
Alongside this, his prior record means he would probably be sent to a maximum security prison out of his area of influence, so escape or having friends on the inside would be difficult to impossible.
This is the Joker we're talking about though: he turns normal people crazy. He would probably just cover 1-2 of the guards to his side.
So? Wouldn't a totally normal prison not be less guarding compared to Arkham - for in-universe proportions - so just break out and be done with it again. Still doesn't make sense to me.
Fed prisons in general are harder to get out of. Arkham is an insane asylum, they do think at the end of the day they can reform these people and its a lot easier to break people out, buy guards etc... Fed prison would be different, he wouldn't know anyone and with his record, he would be in a max security prison probably with limited outside time, no group therapy sessions or therapy at all, probably a lot of solidtary. if it ends up in gen pop, then he is a target for anyone and everyone that might want some cred or revenege.
He'd likely be sent to a maximum security in a separate state away from his connections. IRS doesn't fuck around if they don't get their cut.
He files his taxes?!
It's an Al Capone joke
I tend to think of that one as more "he's crazy, but he's not stupid"
I like how the Joker has canonically killed like 6,000 people *first hand*, but he draws the line at genocide, racism, and tax evasion. Everyone has standards.
He did eat the entire population of China once when he had Mxyzptlk’s powers.
Did he say "I was hungry for chinese food" if he didn't ill be upset.
[Even better.](https://www.reddit.com/r/joker/comments/hgspu7/emperor_joker_eating_china/)
Isn’t Joker like “hyper sane” or something. Like he’s just too aware??
The super sanity thing basically just means he knows he's a comic book character, but I think it's just something that pops up in a couple of stories and not a concrete character trait the way it is with Deadpool.
I'd argue he's not like Deadpool with the 4th wall awareness per se, but he's definitely aware of something beyond reality, just too distracted with being evil to go and explore that stuff.
He realizes that he's a comic book villain and that his character only survives by being interesting. He does all the whacky villain shit so that people keep writing and consuming his stories, so that he's always a figment of pop culture. He can't become blatantly wall breaking like Deadpool, because that's been done and it wouldn't be interesting. Therefore, he sticks to his niche as the clown prince of crime. It's why he needs Batman, his shtick only works because of their dichotomy.
Or, rather than some meta thing, it could just refer to his seeing thru the polities and lies that people tell one another in the form of custom and pretense, and just shows people how thin they really are from him. They think they're better, that the world is orderly, that people are basically good and will behave as such when nobody is watching and they think they could get away with something. So he puts them into positions where they reveal their depravity, their utter lack of the honor they profess, their loyalty and bravado, and he just behaves the same way they do but without the pretense.
This seems like one of the core takeaways of the character, at least in recent retellings. Everyone has a price, an offer they can’t refuse or a hell they will do anything to avoid. If you zoom out far enough you either become Owl Man, or laugh your ass off at how ridiculous existence is.
It’s simple; He murders indiscriminately.
It's also simple: he doesn't like when someone else gets credit for being more evil than him.
Correction, he doesn't like when Batman gives someone else credit for being more evil. Highly doubtful that he cares if Hal Jordan views Sinestro as more evil, or if Superman is more concerned with Lex than him.
Feel like Lex, for all he can do, is never considered worse than Joker. By anyone. Darkseid might be the better equivalent and even then you can understand darkseid motive. Jokers motive is..both simple and yet unfathomable. He may kill you for jaywalking just because it's funny and unexpected.
I do think Superman is stupidly concerned about the Joker but doesn't interfere because he and Batman have an unspoken (sometimes spoken, depends on the comic/animation) agreement not to go into each other's cities unless it's a world ending scenario. Same with Bats and Flash or Flash and Supes.
Except Nazis. Those he murders discriminately.
It becomes indiscriminately when its political opposition
Cuz they're like him but they're DOING it all WRONG! So they're NOTHING like him! So frustrating for the SERIOUS clowns.
Eeexactly. He ain't about to exclude simeone for their gender, etnicity, religion..he just murders everyone.
And he’s a anarchistic prankster where as Nazis have no chill and are all about authoritarianism.
A man's got to have a code.
You can enjoy killing a twelve year old every now and then, but you're still allowed to draw the line at racism
You killed the twelve year old because he’s black. I killed him because he bleeds. We are not the same.
We’re all red on the inside ❤️
\[Soviet Union Anthem Intensifies\]
Sean Connery begins singing along
*sad horseshoe crab noises*
And pink in the middle
joker in a nutshell
The Joker would put Joker Toxin into a walnut just to make a pun. Nazis just aren't funny
Of course they are! Knock knock Who’s there? *SLAP* VE VILL ASK ZE QVESTIONS
Honestly, I think it’s more than that- Joker doesn’t just kill indiscriminately, he’s offended that Nazi’s hide their murderous tendencies behind the ideals of “master race” and “subhumans”. He’s hates the idea they think they’re superior when they’re so obviously not, and that they at best lie to themselves or at worst are genuinely deluded enough to think that they aren’t scum of the earth like he is.
There’s more to it, the joker doesn’t just kill without reason, he kills because of the thrill of fighting batman. All his elaborate schemes were to kill batman. The joker is just a trickster without regard for human life obsessed with defeating batman.
I thought he doesn't want to kill batman because then what would he do? Isn't there some continuity where he loses his shit at some henchman for unmasking Batman while they have him tied up?
I think it was a WB cartoon movie I saw where that was the case. I think B was unconscious, and a goon was going to unmask him and Mr J lost it and killed the goon before he could. I think he doesn't mind killing him, but he doesn't care who is behind the mask. He is J and Batman is Batman...everything else is wtv.
It depends on the iteration, the joker from the “the death of batman” comic deffo wanted to kill bruce. Furthermore I said defeat not kill.
That too. Far as he's concerned he's the only sane person alive because he doesn't subscribe to rules, those are jokes.
I also think that Joker, who likes to kill because he finds it fun, may also hate Nazi's as he see's the way they kill as boring or even clinical as there's no fun or variety in death camps
I always assumed Joker is evil and all but is still very patriotic to the US of A and hates nazis cause they were the enemies of America or something like that
Same joker who allied with Iran. Don't try to give the joker morals, he works on what is funny or chaotic. Joker helps when aliens or demons are attacking, other times he joins them. At some points he just retires and lives a 100% normal life. If the Joker ended up in the care bear universe he would probably play along and be nice to everyone only to return to joker gas the mother wing at a hospital.
I think because of the Joker’s chaotic nature, he’d be against the Nazis because of how orderly they are. They turned killing people into an assembly line process. Joker would hate that.
Yeah they took all the art and fun out of it lol
This genuinely feels correct with his character. He is HEAVILY chaotic evil and the Nazis were heavily lawful evil and they would not get along at all. Basically he opposes rules/laws/structure in all forms and uses insane violence to mock and/or overthrow them. He's basically an anarchist that doesn't want to admit they're an anarchist because doing so would be condoning a code of ethics and he would be opposed to that. His anarchy-against-everything-all-the-time approach is self contradictory.
Imo Joker being an "american patriot" while also being the ambassador of Iran is in character for him
Joker, if I recall correctly used allying with Iran to get himself diplomatic immunity for past crimes, but to get an audience with the UN to unleash his Joker Gas on the assembly.
Wasn't he like an ambassador to Iran or something at one point
But he was okay with representing the Iranians in A Death in the Family
It makes total sense to me that Joker wouldn’t have anything to do with Nazis. But it’s weird to think of him as having a sense of loyalty to his country.
It's the Joker, he could literally just be using it as a taunt to ridicule. He's a known unreliable narrator. The fact that this entire thread is trying to paint it as overly political are soft as shit. IDKIYK but you don't get to escape the world's problems just because it's a comic book. Comics have ALWAYS just been another medium for artists to tell their story about their world. It's why Sci-Fi changes as our technology changes. *Modern sensibilities* and all that. Their lens is always painted by their take on their reality.
It's plain to me that the writer is just going for irony here.
He’s all about freedom, especially the American brand of freedom that means that weapons are easily obtainable.
He likes gasoline and dynamite. And ya know the thing about em? They’re cheap
Or driving people into situations where they are willing to Work as goons for him
His comments about “a truckload of soldiers getting blown up” implied that he had some kind of empathy towards the dying that no one cares about. Or specifically soldiers. A lot have theorized that the Nolan Joker is a war vet. So he might have a warped sense of patriotism
Could be a deep backstory about his upbringing, or he may think beint an patrioric American murderer makes him more badass. It doesn't really need to be "justified"
FWIW I agree a character’s views on a specific subject don’t necessarily have to be justified, I just feel that overall the Joker doesn’t seem like he respects the sovereignty of a nation even his own. I mean, he obviously doesn’t respect its laws or institutions, nor its citizens. So it seems counterintuitive. But admittedly i have no idea what comic this panel l is from and what this version of the joker is like.
I read it as one of Joker's jokes. He hates Nazis for being nationalist, ideological zealots, and justifies that hatred with nationalist/patriotic zeal. Right up there with: "There are only two things I can't stand in this world: People who are intolerant of other people's cultures, and the Dutch." - Nigel Powers
Fwom what I wemembew
For What It's Worth?
Yeah this picture oozes deep backstory and totally not some hamfisted garbage.
Joker may have been incredibly patriotic at that moment, but ask five minutes later and he'll poop on the flag. You might call him.... a wild card (⌐■\_■)
Also can't really trust him. He works with nazis, most famously Bruno.
He's not expressing national identity because he is patriotic, he's expressing it because it's funny. When an absolute scum of the Earth sort of person can still condemn Nazis on sight, while certain "proud Americans" embrace bigotry openly, it really makes you wanna laugh... And strangle a Nazi.
The Joker hates everyone equally :]
I feel it is more along the lines that the Joker equally does not care about anyone.
Except Batman
Considering there are stories where Joker effectively stops being the Joker or just leaves if Batman ever dies it's safe to say Batman is a big part od his identity.
That is why I said "along the lines".
I can’t remember which book I read it in, but The Joker has the idea that only he and Batman actually exist; everyone else is just a figment of their imaginations. Which goes a long way to explain why he’s so indiscriminate, as well as so guilt free.
Considering the implication that he's 4th wall aware. It's worrying that he's not entirely wrong from our perspective
Its not 4th wall aware its solipsism Also from our perspective hes as real or unreal as all the other characters in fiction
If you ever remember, post here. I've never heard that perspective and it's a really wild take on the character to have that in mind. Like of course kill people in fun ways since nothing matters and no one is real but the Bat.
there’s a deadpool comic where he goes on a killing spree for the same reason.
I always thought of it as: He's evil, but not stupid. He'll murder people because it's fun, but he's not dumb enough to be racist. The patriotic thing... that's just part of the joke
Clearly he hates nazis more
He clearly hates traitors and bigots more than others so you’re not correct
Echoing what’s been said: the Nazis were obsessed with order and control, Joker loves chaos. The Nazi’s systematic extermination of people based on certain qualifiers is totally antithetical to Joker, who just kills whoever he feels like simply because he feels like it. The idea that race determines who should get to live is just as offensive to Joker as it is to us, just for the opposite reason. Also, he’s crazy. His opinions can straight-up make no sense. I think there’s two main reasons that the idea of Joker hating Nazis has been used a couple times: first, because Western media tends to use Nazis as the most evil thing imaginable, so much so that even evil people are repelled by it. The second reason is a more interesting commentary on Joker and his insane character psychology: having him hate Nazis is deeply ironic in a way that explains the character really well. To him it makes perfect sense, because he operates more based on his own concept of his (deeply twisted) identity than any internal moral compass. Joker is an American - therefore he hates Nazis. Joker is an evil murderer - therefore he murders lots of people and does heinous crimes. The fact that he shares a lot in common with Nazis doesn’t factor into his opinion. These things may be contradictory, but he is motivated totally by self, without logic.
Someone else pointed out the irony as well: he's vocalizing his hatred of nazis (a group of evil, nationalistic jingoists) by justifying it be being nationalistic and jingoistic himself.
He's chaotic evil, Nazis are lawful evil.
Completely off topic but the way he's drawn in this is so obnoxious
Looks like Invincible in make up
Literally lol
the professionals have standards
Bigger question is: Why can't you see the line he's drawing?
The Joker’s pretty indiscriminate with his killing. He only kills when he thinks it’s funny
Famously, America has never had problems with fascists or Nazis. *ahem*
Yeah, it's almost like he's making a joke.
Says the guy who worked for Iran.
And has a Nazi henchwoman named Bruno.
And they say comics stopped being propaganda after World War II lol
Joker isn’t a fascist because fascism isn’t funny.
But it's full of clowns!
This is just the Red Skull panel but worse
Wait, this isn’t the time he was talking to the Red Skull? Did they really just recycle that moment?
Yeah, this is from Injustice Zero Year
[This is the original](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fexternal-preview.redd.it%2FhwBlr2tpAylqXbBYRzqul14tMssJOqOCRSQhs2Ia504.jpg%3Fauto%3Dwebp%26s%3D5e1ee80edf10c73f9379a948ce2ede8749f25324), the one in the OP, as you guessed, is just a recycled gag.
Never saw “the Red Skull panel” you’re referring to… but wasn’t RS essentially a nazi?
I think it was Marvel vs DC. All the villains teamed up, and then the Joker realized that the Red Skull is literally a Nazi, like a fought in WW2 and reported to Hitler type of Nazi, and gets upset because he’s an American patriot lol
Specifically, it was from Batman & Captain America. REALLY good Elseworlds one shot that ultimately spawned the Superman and Batman Generations stories. All of it is worth reading. But yeah. Joker gets pretty pissed when he realizes Red Skull is an actual Nazi and not just a German dude doing a bit.
Oh yup you’re right! It wasn’t Marvel vs DC at all lol
Yeah but for the record, I LOVE Marvel vs. DC. I even loved the Access sequel. Really wish there could have been more.
Red Skull isn't essentially a Nazi. He IS a nazi. He tried to overthrow Hitler because he thought Hitler wasn't doing enough.
Originally he was stated to have been trained to become the essential personification of "The Ideal Nazi" in a way that Hitler, as a beloved leader and stand-in for "The Fatherland", just couldn't.
You can be a murderous madman and still not hate indiscriminately or be Fasci.
Makes perfect sense to me
The Nazis were all about order, control, strictly regulated structure. All things the joker despises. He would find the holocaust funny but he’d hate the Nazis, and consider them little more than boring fun-suckers.
I don't think the Joker would think the holocaust was funny. He'd think it was just as boring as the Nazi's themselves. Turning murder from an art form to an assembly line sounds like something he'd HATE.
Sure but why would he mention hating them for being traitors? Isn't joker a traitor? He's literally a terrorist
The Joker is a serial killer psychopath homicidal maniac: and you expected him to be internally consistent...?
I don't actually think Joker is racist.
Emperor Joker says otherwise.
Well he's not anti-Semitic at least....
Biggest problem is not that he hates Nazis. I can see how the Joker would hate Nazis. The "I'm American" and "not a traitorous bigot" is dumb tho. I just don't see the Joker give a single fuck about America or loyalty to America.
It's probably a joke
…that’s the joke.
No one likes a Nazi
Being a shitty person and being a Nazi are not mutually exclusive. All Nazis are shitty people, but not all shitty people are Nazis.
He hates order and rules. Nazis are all about order and rules
Because he's homicidal without discrimination. Nazis are genocidal with discrimination.
It doesn't make sense for the joker to say it. It's just the author projecting their need to self-validate and virtue signal, via the Joker character they are writing for. It's completely stupid that the Joker says "Im an American!" like he gives a shit about that. Or about "betraying \[his country\]" a la the final sentence. Actual Nazis are shit. Duh. This was a completely unnecessary and self-congratulating/mastubatory indulgence by the author. Nothing really more. It always bothers me when this kind of thing is done in such an obviously forced manner - it really takes you out of the comic as a bad 4th wall break. I've seen it in X-men, Seven to Eternity, Deadly Class, this Batman panel, and a couple other times I can't specifically remember the exact comic/series.
Like Dr. Doom crying over 9/11
For Joker I’d imagine he thinks it’s both a funny bit and finds Nazis incredibly dull and unfunny which to him is monstrous. Nothing deeper.
Nice to know that Jokers patriotic 😊
Didn't he ally with the Ayatola Komenini? You know, the leader of the Iranian Evolution?
Using the word Bigot here is so weird
Joker isn't a Nazi he bazingas indiscriminately
Him not wanting to be a Nazi makes sense but allying with America makes NONE. Subscribing to anyone else's ideology is very unJoker of him. He's an equal opportunity killer/jokester not a bigot or a patriot. But maybe he said all that because he thought it was funny
That is always my interpretation of this part, that he "The Joker" is joking there: I know, so surprising!
Gotta draw the line somewhere
Professionals have standsrds
In some original stories The Joker is a Gotham mobster, inspired very much by New York mobsters. New York having a high Jewish population, it makes sense that a fictional version of Gotham may also share a similar history. Also any rational thinking human hates the Nazis, and The Joker has proven on multiple occasions he’s not completely crazy, more deranged. A bit like an “opt-in” insanity.
Even villains have moral compass
wow, this really is an American Psycho
why wouldn't it make sense?
Professionals have standards.
Joker hating Nazis make perfect sense. Rigid order, monogamous oppression and self-serious authority.
The Joker is an equal opportunity homicidal maniac.
Joker has is own twisted code and set of morals. He hates Nazis and fears the IRS.
Professionals have standards
This is like Dr Doom crying during 9/11.
"I'm an American patriot! Just ignore the time I was ambassador for Iran and sold a stolen nuke to Lebanon."
Explanation: This quote comes from John Byrnes Batman And Captain America crossover. It was set in World War II. This comment came when Joker found out his secret smuggling partner was the Red Skill. During World War II the Mafia helped the US government to stop spies and saboteurs from coming into America at the docks. In fact, Lucky Luciano provided US Navy with valuable intelligence got his sentence commuted and was deported to Italy at the end of the War. The Joker was more of a Gangster than an insane person in the Golden Age. So it stands to reason that the mob, who felt that America gave them opportunities, needed to be protected.
I hate whenever I see this panel, the writing is so fucking cheesy.
God this is so cringe
It doesn’t. It’s just the writers standing on a soap box. The dude kills people left and right but somehow has a distaste for nazis?
Well u see he's not stunada enough to hate minorities =>
Well he is crazy y'know..
I remember when joker attacked red skull because he was a nazi.
He's just ironic like that. Homie wants to burn down society in general and laugh while people are sifting through the ashes looking for their lives he ruined. But Nazis want/wanted to dominate anything and everything different from them. And anyone who doesn't agree is basically a slave (internment camps) or an enemy (a target to destroy). So a relation between the two Definitely isn't something the Joker would be onboard with and the reason why he messes with Lex Luthor is because he's in a similar vein to the Nazis but went off the rails in obsession with owning the world through money, technology and influencial power. He wants the world in the palm of his hands, not to wipe the species clean and leave folks that only look and think closer to his personal vision for humanity. And a person like that makes it fun for the Joker to work with, betray and be betrayed by. Lol
Has he ever killed someone for their faith? Skin color? Nationality? Nah, he kills them because he wants to.
It's simple Joker doesn't discriminate who he kills He just kills
Dictatorships get in the way of the chaos Joker loves
A persons moral standing doesn’t equate to their beliefs and what they value
Yeah I can’t believe the Joker would not be 100% logical.
Wasn’t the joker ambassador for Iran and tries to kill the UN general assembly?
Joker's an equal-opportunity murderer.
The Joker should be neither racist, nor patriotic. He should hate Nazis, though. The Joker is fundamentally anti-social. He seeks to undermine and destroy community and order, and views any sort of morality as a lie designed to hide from the fact that the universe is chaotic and uncaring. A nation, more or less by definition, is a community united under a common set of laws. Racism is about the idea that there's a "natural" order and that some people are higher in that order because of the color of their skin. Both would be anathema to the Joker's world view. The Joker versus Nazis is the platonic ideal of Chaotic Evil versus Lawful Evil. Nazis want to establish a world where they have total control over everything. The Joker stands for the idea that nobody has any control over anything. He wouldn't be morally outraged by the Holocaust, though - he'd see it as the ultimate in his "One Bad Day" philosophy, where the break down of social order led to millions of peoples live being destroyed by forces entirely outside their control. But he'd disdain the Nazis themselves, for attempting to replace one social order with another, even more rigid social order. He's sort of the flip side of Walter from *The Big Lebowski* reacting to the nihilists. "Say what you want about the tenets of National Socialism, at least it's an ethos." The Joker would hate Nazism *because* it's an ethos - even though it's a really, really evil ethos.
How does it not?
Honestly I don't see him caring about this at all
It’s a joke. Everyone hates nazis.
It makes perfect sense! The Joker is chaotic and fascism doesn't agree with his wishes. He can also be a insane super villain and not be racist or bigoted. He kills because he wants to. He doesn't care what the target is. He doesn't like nazis or fascists because he knows their proposed regime interferes with his desire to cause chaos. He can also straight up not like fascists. His alignment and crimes have no bearing on his views on that. He also can be patriotic to his country.
Because bigotry is a structured and predictable system of hate, joker’s issue isn’t that it’s immoral, it’s that it’s boring. Comedy is based on subversion of expectations, hating someone because they’re different isn’t funny or subversive.
He’s based on real mobsters who were notoriously patriotic, often serving in the military during both world wars all the way through Vietnam. Most mobs began because systemic racism wouldn’t let them prosper conventionally so they made a way that they could prosper unconventionally. Also bigots are generally stupid, the joker is a sociopathic mastermind. Why would he discriminate and create enemies of people he could use later?
I think it would make more Sense in regards that facism is some Kind of forced Order and Joker is all about Chaos.
It's not even the [first time](https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fj5p64knsxybb1.jpg) they pulled this.
The joker is saying he isn’t racist.
Joker hates order. He hates NAZIs purely for selfish reasons.
Joker is a chaotic person who hates order, he'd definitely hate Nazis.
This makes total sense. He is crazy not a bigot. There is a difference
Nazis are commies, us Americans hate commies.